The Tourism Authority of Thailand (TAT) aims to increase overall revenue from the European market as many European economies have been recovering.

TAT Governor Thawatchai Arunyik recently said that the authority has adjusted its growth target of European visitors from 9 to 11 percent. It also hopes for an increase in the overall revenue from European tourists to 13 percent from the originally projected 11 percent.

In 2013, the European market generated 410 billion THB in revenue for the local tourism industry.

Thawatchai added that TAT is seeking ways to compensate for the declining overall market. If the growth of tourists from Europe in the second quarter is lower than 10 percent, the targeted number of overall tourists of 28.01 million and revenue of 1.32 trillion THB may be missed.

Furthermore, in case the caretaker government cannot allocate the 200 million THB budget for marketing between June and July, it means that there is an even lower number of tourists.

TAT may have to allocate extra budget to achieve the desired number of tourists this year.-VNA